*NEW BIRTH AND SALVATION* We need to make an important distinction between new birth and salvation. Let us look for a moment in John 1:11-13 about the new birth. *He [Jesus] came to His own [place or home], and His own [people] did not receive Him...* Thank God for the word “but” that follows. This was not the end. There are many wonderful occurrences of “but” in the Bible (see Romans 6:23, for example). In John’s gospel, we continue: *But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right [I prefer to say “authority”] to become children of God, to those who believe in His name: who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.* To be born of God is new birth. In street meetings, in the city of Kwekwe in Zimbabwe in particular, I have had the privilege of leading people into the new birth. I said to them, “If you want to be born again, there is one thing you have to do: You have to receive Him!” That is the key to the new birth—receiving Jesus. The text says, *“As many as received Him....”* You have got to open your heart personally and welcome the Lord in. He also says, *“Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in ” (Revelation 3:20).* What a blessing it is to assure people that if they invited Jesus in, He has kept His promise: He has come in. The new birth is a one-time experience. A person never needs to be born again twice. Much of it is potential, in a certain sense: we receive authority to become children of God. However, authority is useless if not used. What we become depends on how much we use the authority that we are given. When I ministered in the rural areas in Gokwe, Zimbabwe, I observed that an African’s attitude is, “There is no harm in asking for it.” If you give an African a pair of shoes, he will probably say, “Thank you! But where are the socks?” If he knows there is something to be received by asking, he will usually come and ask for it. Therefore, it is not difficult to get people to come forward in sub Saharan Africa in an appeal. Rather, it is difficult to stop them! I struggled to teach people that, once they had asked to receive Jesus, they did not have to keep asking. He had come in! The real victory was when they did not come forward again—because then they had grasped the fact that they had received Him. In contrast to new birth, salvation is an ongoing process. It is not a one-time experience. You might be born again but, as for salvation, how far have you come? Salvation is referred to in three tenses: in the perfect tense, the simple past tense, and the continuing present tense. Ephesians 2:8 says: *“For by grace you have been saved through faith....”* That is the perfect tense. Translated literally, Paul is saying, *“By grace you are having-been-saved.”* It is completed. Titus 3:5 says: *“Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to His mercy, He [God] saved us.”* That is the simple past tense. For me, there was a specific moment in time when God saved me: it was around 8pm on a Friday evening the 7th of July 1994. There is one particular moment when we personally enter into the provision of God. In 1 Corinthians 1:18 we find the continuing present tense: *“For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.”* The continuing present tense means “us who are continually being saved.” In summation, we have a one-time experience in which we can say, “God saved me.” Through that experience, we enter into a salvation which is already complete: we are having-been-saved. But, at the same time, salvation continues to work in us: we are continually being saved. A vivid illustration of this is Noah’s ark. There are two main arks in the Old Testament: the big ark of Noah and the little ark of Moses. Both are pictures of Christ. The big ark speaks of me in Christ; the little ark speaks of Christ in me. Each of them speaks of Christ. Focusing on the big ark of Noah, we see that salvation came through entering that ark. At a certain time, Noah and his family entered into the ark and they were saved. The ark was already complete and perfect. It had been built exactly according to God’s instructions. It never had to be repaired; it never had to be adjusted or improved or recalled. It worked perfectly! And thank God it did, because it would have been too late if it had not! The moment they entered into the ark, they entered into a perfect salvation. But all the time they were in the ark, the ark was continually saving them from the waters that raged all around. https://chat.whatsapp.com/ElKaNjH1oHz6UF5yulS7b2